Chris Cutler is a British ‪‪performer, author, and the founder/CEO of the independent label and distribution network ReR Megacorp that specialises in experimental music. He became well-known as a drummer of the 1970s experimental group Henry Cow. As a researcher, he was involved with The International Association for the Study of Popular Music from its inception in the early '80s and in his theoretical/critical book File Under Popular he proposed that ‘musicians themselves develop a theory of music and culture derived from their own practice’, an idea now resurgent in the concept of 'Practice as Research'. Chris will perform an improvisation set with Yumi Hara and Guy Harries, followed by a conversation regarding his ongoing podcast series. Probes combines research, theory, presentation and curation - a practical model of the value and possible mode of presentation for research output by practitioners.

Black Box Studio, US.3.38
University Square Stratford
University of East London
1 Salway Road
London E15 1NF

Bing Selfish, non-benevolent dictator ot the world (with the exception of Patagonia and Australia, naturlich) continues to rule in a classically megalomaniac manner, and this time he's dabbling in big budget movies and maybe even gettin' the band back together. Featuring a window into the lives of Selfish Citizens, an amazing takeaway menu, a scary trip to Australia and an even scarier open mic night. And education, always education.

25 marzo 2017

Mike Hobart (Financial Times) e Jane 'Paintbox Jane' Mann (LondonJazz) esaltano entrambi il virtuoso ritrovo di Mike Westbrook e Jonathan Gee allo Steinway 2 Piano Festival la settimana scorsa, presso il londinese Pizza Express: "The annual two-piano Steinway Festival combines strong-character stylists with minimal preparation and high hopes that a spark will ignite. Contrasts are highlighted, songbooks shared and both players tend to raise their game. There was no coasting in this performance, but for the most part Mike Westbrook and Jonathan Gee performed singly and, when they did join forces, the balance of the repertoire was tilted firmly in Westbrook’s direction. Even one of Gee’s solo spots drew on his counterpart’s back catalogue. Westbrook’s intensely personal vision is usually articulated through orchestral arrangement, and at this gig he almost seemed to play every part that an orchestra might play. His pared-down piano style fuses the percussive resonance of Duke Ellington with elements of the blues, dissonant modernism and vaudeville into intense narratives in which every chord has character and even silence has a role to play."

Quando l'album venne ristampato da Enja nel 2011 in versione rimasterizzata - in precedenza Enja (2CD, 1993) e prima ancora Original Records (3LP, 1982) - scrisse Duncan Heining: "The Westbrooks have made many beautiful and profound records but this is my favourite. That I can say that without forgetting Metropolis, Citadel/Room 315, Marching Song, The Westbrook Blake, Chanson Irresponsable, Mama Chicago, London Bridge, Art Wolf, The Westbrook Rossini or On Duke’s Birthday is a measure of the man’s music. How many jazz composers could point to a career as rich in masterpieces as that? One always feels with a Westbrook & Westbrook project that every detail has been addressed in order to make the most complete artistic statement. The first emphasis is on the music, the second to ensure it allows the expression of something beyond itself. Here the idea of a New Orleans funeral procession is a metaphor for life’s journey. Shame then that Enja have truncated the original explanatory sleevenotes to their detriment. No matter, you can still revel in the righteousness of Cordoba, Westbrook’s magnificent setting of Lorca, or the glorious Santarcangelo with Hubert Parry’s arrangement of Jerusalem at its heart. There are splendours too in Democratie and July ’79, an affirmation of the natural world in Erme Estuary and so much, more beauty in this CD. Should there be a heaven and should I get an invite, may this be the music to carry me there."

21 marzo 2017

Frank J. Oteri di New Music USA riporta una bella conversazione tenuta di recente con Mike Johnson, offrendo ai lettori un pezzo ampio e articolato che ripercorre le molte vicende del musicista e le tappe dell'evoluzione del gruppo Thinking Plague, di cui han fatto a lungo parte Bob Drake e Dave Kerman. Circa il senso di diffidenza e critico sconforto generato fin dai titoli dagli album più recenti - A History of Madness, Decline and Fall, l'ultimo Hoping Against Hope - Mike spiega: "I’ve never been able to go with a direction that’s just celebrating or joy and I have felt for a long time that it is important for my artistic activity to make some commentary about what’s going on in the world. Part of that is my work background. Since the '80s, I have been working in human services programs, like working with the homeless, helping people to get shelter, helping people to get jobs. Then I worked with poor students to help them deal with all the issues that were keeping them from being able to be successful. I had a day career out of this, and I was good at it. That informed my music, because when I went back to college after the music stuff, I took a lot of social science classes - politics and sociology and all this kind of stuff. My perspective definitely moved left, and I’ve been there ever since. The cliché is that as men get older, they get more conservative. Me, I’m moving left. I’m left of left now. I don’t even know where I am."

Described in the Independent on Sunday as ‘perhaps the greatest work in all British jazz’, Mike Westbrook’s settings of William Blake’s powerful poetry were originally commissioned in 1971 for the National Theatre production of Adrian Mitchell’s Tyger. The Westbrook Blake, with vocalists Phil Minton and Kate Westbrook, has been performed many times over the years in Blake’s city, London, as well as in Festivals throughout Europe, in New York and Australia. The current choral version is featured on the DVD/CD Glad Day Live, released on Westbrook Records.

During the March to April 1970 sessions for Mike Westbrook's Love Songs, The Mike Westbrook Concert Band, The Welfare State, Original Peter and a whole host of other long-forgotten performers and speciality acts including the esoterically named likes of The Amazing Mas-Kar, The Edmund Campion Gymnasts and, erm, 'Cherokee Indian Joe The Great Leaping Bison' (we can probably safely assume that he wasn't) took part in an ambitious small screen extravaganza somewhere between a progressive rock concert and a down-at-heel carnival, which was captured by the Review cameras in all of its chaotic glory. The film was first broadcast on Saturday 25th April 1970, as part of an edition that also featured a report on the Hayward Gallery's major retrospective on reclusive photographer Bill Brandt, and was subsequently selected for the highlights special Summer Review on 22nd August, where it appeared alongside a lively interview with William Hobbs, 'Fight Director' at the National Theatre. Shortly afterwards, the ensemble took the entire spectacle on the road as the centrepiece of their lengthy 'Earthrise Tour', which must have caused no little alarm for audiences in search of rock posturing, lengthy soloing and the usual hard and heavy 'serious' early seventies clichés.

The Vocal Constructivists worked closely with American composer, philosopher, writer, activist, and visionary Pauline Oliveros, who passed away in November 2016. The group pays tribute to her life and work in a wide-ranging programme that draws from over six decades of her career. Featured works will include her 1961 Sound Patterns, awarded the Gaudeamus International Composers Award in 1962, text scores from Sonic Meditations (1971), Wind Horse (1989), and the participatory A New Indigo Peace (2008). As well as works by Oliveros, the ensemble will perform Robert Ashley’s She Was a Visitor (1967), and new commissions – all receiving their world premiere – by composers who knew and worked with her.

"Bundles of people have contributed over the years, some gone, others holding on and yet others joining and putting their distinctive mark on the contents and direction of the blog. Currently we have about half a dozen active posters and some very generous followers, judging from inputs to our contributions section, but we're always willing to recruit more. Potential authors can get in touch with us c/o our Blogger email addresses. We've had contributors from three continents, with a preponderance of Europeans overall. The emphasis has been on the free/improv/experimental side of jazz, but with excursions into contemporary and classical music, from Europe and beyond. There are no rules, however; the blog is whatever the posters make of it, and we'd like to keep it that way. We focus on posting out of print material with the objective of drawing attention to music which otherwise might have remained out of sight and out of mind."

Scrive Pinsent: "The team effort says something about how, through music, we can build on stage a working model of how human relations could change, how society could work better. Even if it’s just for two hours on stage, we can learn from it. John Stevens, the UK improviser, believed strongly in this possibility, and manifested it in all of his directed team efforts, harnessing the energy of great musicians to show a way of living, working and doing that was a model of how a co-operative society could work. I’ve always thought This Heat believed in that too; at the Barbican, they proved it. Some media write-ups and appraisals have pointed out the gap between the original This Heat and this event; for instance, the concert handout tells us it’s been 40 years since the band’s first gig in 1976. Well, maybe this isn’t really a gap; I would argue that it has in fact been a necessary waiting process, a maturation. The band This Heat had to exist in the 1970s and 1980s, in order to influence musicians Thurston Moore and many others (becoming a “cult” band, I suppose, much as I hate that term), and the impact of their work sunk into the culture in a gradual way. Think of it as a slow release of benign energy, a healing and changing power. The time is now right for that cycle to complete; by bringing their own history, with This Heat DNA mixed into it, the 14 musicians were able to realise the “perfect” version of This Heat we saw in March 2017. If I am right in these fervoured ravings, maybe the event says something about the way culture ought to happen; it’s not instant, it’s slow, and mysterious, but when it works – it’s a glorious and unstoppable force for good."

It has been more than 30 years now since self-taught composer, vocalist and saxophonist Joane Hétu has been following her own highly distinctive path through the vast territory of creative, contemporary music. From her beginnings with song-based new-rock bands such as Wondeur Brass, Justine and Les Poules, Hétu turned to composition (the evocative triptych comprising Musique d’hiver, Filature and La femme territoire ou 21 fragments d’humus) and improvisation, more often than not combining both within her general approach to music. She has co-directed the Ensemble SuperMusique since its founding in 1998, as well as the weekly series Mercredimusics since 2002. More recently she gave birth to La chorale bruitiste Joker (2012). Joane Hétu was awarded the prestigious Freddie Stone Award in 2006.

Bringing together inspirational musicians is always an exciting prospect. Voices in the Night is a one-off, unique event featuring some of the finest, internationally acclaimed free improvisers with the only composed element being the pre-determined small groupings of duos, trios and quartets. Naturally, 'voices' relates to the instrumentalists as much as to the vocalists - each artist is distinctive in expression, however each performance this evening will also include a human voice. Maggie Nicols, Ute Wassermann, Phil Minton, Kay Grant and Luisa Tucciariello are the extraordinary vocalists in the 'Voices in the Night' cast, and they'll perform non-hierarchically in small ensembles alongside their equally distinguished instrumentalist colleagues John Edwards (double bass), John Russell (guitar), Mark Sanders (drums/percussion), Alex Ward (clarinet), Neil Metcalfe (flute), Michael de Souza (guitar) and Alison Blunt (violin).
Whether you're just starting to listen to music that wouldn't get mainstream airplay or whether you're a regular listener to adventurous music, the 'live' experience offers the full-colour version of listening - and this line-up is full of magic. Quoting guitarist Derek Bailey: "Undeniably, the audience for improvisation has a power that no other audience has. It can affect the creation of that which is being witnessed. And perhaps because of that possibility the audience for improvisation has a degree of intimacy with the music that is not achieved in any other situation." Come and be part of the evening in the congenial acoustic and charming setting that is Iklectik.

Kuda.org is an independent cultural organization which since 2001 brings together artists, theoreticians, media activists, researchers and the wider public in the research of contemporary art theory and practice, cultural policies, activism and politics. kuda.org tends to make an intervention in the sphere of research and artistic and social experimentation within the field of art and cultural production, from the position of institutional critique and critique of cultural policies. Facing processes of cultural industries and culturalization of politics and art, the collective attempts to map and encourage acts of critique and resistance to comodification of results of art production including attempts of transformation and critique of relations of production which are in the field of art production and outer-art social processes being reproduced through shifts of ideological and „political“ matrixes, which are in the last instance consequence of recuperation of people. kuda.org creates platform for an open dialogue, experimental education, collaboration and research, and open access to different knowledge resources. Within kuda.org, there have been organized several hundreds public events: lectures and presentations of visiting artists and theorists, workshops, exhibitions, conferences and international publishing project.